The duties of a later-day essayist and satirist are never easy. The days are long and hard and the questions put to me, by friend and foe alike, often quixotic. The remuneration, unremarkable. Unremarkable.

In that context, a hysterical call from a passionate lady in Seattle was received by me this past night~~comme ca:

Mr. Begg, Mr., Begg, is that Mr. Begg?For now, we’ll say yes, my dear, for now~~how can I be of solace to you?Mr. Begg, it says on the television that all the politicians are being poisoned.ALL of them?So it seems.I AM all ears, my dear.Mr. Begg, if all of the politicians are poisoned in their sleep tonight and die, how would we survive?Survive?What I mean is, if all the politicians were all poisoned in their sleep tonight what would happen?Relax, sweetheart, their replacements wait, panting, to crawl over the bodies of the dead and assume command.But, what if it kept happening?What kept happening, my dear?That every night, all the politicians were poisoned in their sleep.ALL of them?Yes, all of them, and what if it kept happening and happening to their replacements as well, every single, solitary, night?ALL of them, EVERY night?Yes, what would you say to that?I???Yes, Mr. Begg, what if every politician all over the world were poisoned at night, every night, until there were no more politicians at all~~anywhere?NONE at all, anywhere—in the world?Yes, Sir—all gone—what would you say?I???Yes, Sir, you.I would have to say~~PLEASE, JESUS!!!And, after that what would you say, Sir?I??You’re the one on the line—it’s just you and I—she’d turned a rude and sarcastic little thing at this juncture.Well dear, I would then have to say, THANK YOU, JESUS!!But Mr. Begg, if the all the politicians in the whole wide world kept getting poisoned in their sleep ever night, who would lead us?LEAD??Yes, Sir, who would lead us?Miss, you are a confused girl. Come, knell next to me, close your eyes and pray.Why? Please UN-confuse me~~Mr. Begg.You think politicians LEAD us?Don’t they?No, dear~~they BLEED us!!How so?How so? They are thieves~~they steal your money and party with it. They are petty criminals~~pickpockets~~street hoodlums~~worse so, than prostitutes.Prostitutes, Sir?I said, Prostitutes and I meant prostitutes—these girls are of a higher moral fiber than are politicians.They are, Sir?They are, Miss.I didn’t know, Sir.Miss—prostitutes offer a tangible, tactile~~yes~~ touchable, product for an agreed price. Politicians offer no product at all at an exorbitant price.All of them, Sir~~all politicians are worse so than common street walkers?Yes, my dear, ALL of them.But they say they are PUBLIC SERVANTS, Mr. Begg.Do they, now?They do!Do you, Miss, feel as though you are being served~~and lead? That they are as servants to you~~as well as leaders?Well, no, in fact, they live like the King and Queen and I like their servant.You do?I do.Well done, Missy~~nicely done~~you’ve solved your own riddle~~off to bed with you!I can sleep tight, Mr. Begg?Tight as a teenager, sweetheart, tight as a teenager.Mr. Begg~~Sir, if all this comes to pass, will you~~Sir~~stand forward and lead us to a Great Religious Awakening in America?I??Yes, Sir~~you, Sir.I??Please, Sir!!Darling, I am not fond of poison.We will keep you alive~~Sir.So you say~~now. But if this is some Heavenly Sent tooth fairy poisoning the politicians, why would that angel, spare me, dear?Because we need you, Sir~~you are funny and honest.I??You, Sir.I regret I cannot be a candidate.Why not, Sir~~you’d be letting the people downWell, they are used to that, aren’t they?We can all have our dreams, can’t we, sir?Of course you may, my dear, and I my own dreams.Which for you Sir?I??Yes, Sir~~of what will you dream~~Sir?I will dream of the poison angel or tooth~~fairy or whomsoever he may be, poisoning as you say, all the politicians in the entire world, every night until naught is left at all~~ Ah~Men.What a sweet dream, Mr. BeggYou betcha, bebe!!Nite~~nite, Sir.Nite~nite, angel.

Idle angels

Idle and mischievous little angels, plot all sorts of naughty bits. These frisky Cherubs plot to poison politicians all over the entire world!! My Heavens, me!!

This, here related, all made a long night of very sweet dreams and this morning~~HEY PRESTO!!~~comes Bonnie, bounding in, with the early post~~~

We are much indebted this early morn to delanceyplace.com and their Mr Barry Hankins, whose book is featured in the following excerpt.

We think the table is set for another such Great Religious Awakening in America as that described by our Mr Hankins for a number of compelling reasons.

For instance, as we will see in our note from Mr. Hankins, all the ingredients are set out now, as were then, earlier in history, by him well related to us, on the American table for such a feast. The people are lonely, frightened, cast adrift, leaderless, rudderless, irreligious and noticeably very, very sad.

We notice, in any case, that the American people are very, very sad. Sorely vexed are they. Do you notice this? Oh!!~~why not??

This sadness is, as, the lawyer boys mumble to themselves, ResIpsa–a cute turn of phrase that can be translated from the Latin in any number of ways, depending upon context and, for us, in the present context, means self-manifest.

Yes, that’s right, America’s profound sadness is~~self-manifest.

Put another way, we all got da blues. Da Blues~~with a terrible frown.

The ingredients all present at the table, all America needs is a good cook to roll the dough.

To anticipate what will happen today when the feast is prepared, let us be entertained by what happened at a fest similar, in the American past~~comme ca:

We commence to quote from our morning note from our friends at delanceyplace.com and their Mr. Hankins until noted by us, quoting ceased:

In today’s encore selection — prior to the American Revolution, the British had forbidden the colonists from moving beyond the Appalachian mountains. With American independence, the metaphorical floodgates were opened and there was a massive westward migration of Americans. But this migration had a cost — the wholesale disruption of the support provided by family, community and church, and the loneliness and alienation of the frontier. For Protestant church leaders in the East, who were already under assault from the deism of the American intellectual elite, this disruption in church membership was a crisis, and they began to form missionary societies and use revivals to take the gospel to the West. With this came a pivotal moment in American history — the Great Revival of 1801 and the Second Great Awakening:

“[Encouraged by the smaller but successful Gasper River revival in 1800, Barton] Stone announced a sacramental service for August 6, 1801. While he surely believed that people would come, neither he nor anyone else could possibly have been prepared for the response that ensued. Eye­witness accounts estimated that between 10,000 and 25,000 people came to Cane Ridge. At the time there were only a quarter-million peo­ple in all of Kentucky and only 1800 in Lexington, Kentucky’s largest city. Technically this was a Presbyterian meeting, but there were many Baptists and Methodists present, including preachers from those denominations. Preaching stands were erected at several points across the camp-meeting field so that several preachers could speak at once to separate audiences. Hundreds were converted, either for the first time in their lives or as part of what Protestants often called a rededication.

“James Finley, who would later become a Methodist minister, was one of those converted at Cane Ridge, and his story was not unusual. He was 21 years of age at the time, the wayward son of a Princeton-trained Presbyterian minister. He had drifted off to the frontier and taken to drinking, dancing, and assorted other activities, all considered serious sins in the Protestant faith of the time. He went to Cane Ridge merely to observe the excitement, being determined not be drawn in. He was also an educated young man, and the frontier emotionalism of revivals was not for him. As he watched hundreds of people shrieking and gyrating in spiritual agony, he was deeply moved and felt physically weak.

“He rushed first to the woods, then to a tavern, where he took a stiff drink to calm himself. He returned to the meeting and walked again among the people caught up in revival, feeling the weight of his own sins pressing on his conscience. After a nearly sleepless night in a haystack, the next day he headed for home. Along the way he stopped in a woods to pray and fell to the ground, unable to move. Neighbors found him, took him to a nearby home and put him to bed. When he awoke, he reported, he felt spiritual release and was able to continue his journey home with the assurance that his sins were forgiven. Finley’s is just one of the more vivid and detailed accounts of conversion at Cane Ridge. Another account has Rachel Martin entering into what was called ‘catalepsy.’ She lay in bed for nine days without moving, speak­ing, or eating before gaining spiritual release and conversion.

“When the revival was completed, it was referred to widely as the greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit since Pentecost in the first cen­tury, when St. Peter and the other apostles preached and saw thousands converted to the new faith. Stone himself … wrote a treatise describing in system­atic fashion some of the emotional gyrations that people experienced during the revival. In addition to Rachel Martin’s catalepsy, he cata­logued these as spiritual exercises: ‘the falling exercise, jerking exer­cise, dancing exercise, barking exercise, laughing exercise, running exercise, and singing exercise.’ Such emotional responses have made it very difficult to evaluate the Cane Ridge revival, and many of these physical manifestations were viewed unfavorably even by contempo­raries. Hardly anyone in that day or since can be objective about such things.

“As one might guess, those who opposed the revivals used the ‘barking exercise’ to argue that these meetings were excessive. Accounts of that particular exercise described people in the throes of spiritual agony rocking back and forth, causing grunts and groans. The faster they rocked, the louder and more staccato the noise, until it even­tually sounded like a bark. Critics also pointed out that along with the spiritual experiences were other more sensate and sensory excesses. Specifically, there was a good deal of alcohol consumed by those who came to the revivals more out of carnal than spiritual curiosity. Huck­sters sold whisky from wagons on the outskirts of the encampment. Moreover, for those who attended primarily to be part of a good party, there were sexual liaisons, leading some to claim that more souls were conceived than saved. While revivals were almost always emotional affairs with crying, shouting, and sometimes falling, excesses such as barking and treeing the devil, often cited to discredit the revivals, were limited. With the possible exception of the early meetings, they never became regular features of the Second Great Awakening. …

“Cane Ridge set off waves of revivals that would last for years, and this Great Revival is generally regarded as the beginning of the Second Great Awakening.”

We are much indebted, and thankful, to delanceyplace.com for their early morning note to us today. Likewise so to Mr. Barry Hankins for his excerpt from his book. We wish both of our contributors great success in this and all their future enterprises!

We now note our quoting, of these fine friends, ceased.

Americans, my dears~~the table is set, the ingredients, ready, for a new Great American Religious Awakening.